


The Weak Points in Armor

by Sarai



Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: F/M, Inej Ghafa-centric, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Post-Book 2: Crooked Kingdom, Reunion, The hurt is more serious but some people are allergic to comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-14
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:54:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28075782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sarai/pseuds/Sarai
Summary: When The Wraith makes berth in Ketterdam harbor, Inej plans to see her friends in the city, but business keeps her on board for one more night.Kaz has other plans.And so do his enemies.
Relationships: Kaz Brekker/Inej Ghafa
Comments: 8
Kudos: 87





	The Weak Points in Armor

**Author's Note:**

> Minor spoilers for King of Scars; minor violence (references to blood)

Ketterdam harbor never felt like home, but it felt like welcome nonetheless. Her first arrival here had been one of the most terrible days of her life and Inej would never forget it, but while Nina had saved Inej, it had been the men who saved Ketterdam. Over the years, Inej had returned to Ketterdam many times. She had berthed The Wraith in the harbor and strolled along the damp streets like she had nothing to hide. 

She would always have a warm welcome on the Geldstraat—not from most there, but from Jesper and Wylan. Not just a warm welcome, either: she knew there was a soft bed and warm meals waiting for her, enthusiasm and grins and massive hugs from Jesper, quiet love and fretting from Wylan who always wanted to be sure she had all the provisions and thick socks she needed. No matter changed in their lives—Wylan had grown into himself, Jesper returned to school, and together they were the strangers merchant pair Kerch had ever seen—Inej always saw the love between them, and they always had space for her.

Less changed with Kaz. 

Kaz still wore crisp black suits and leaned on his crow’s-head cane, and kept half-legible books in his attic room at the top of the Slat, the real information stored safely in his head. He had worn a beard for a while, though it never suited him. He was severe and his eyes were cold, but he had a half-smile increasingly ready for Inej.

Jesper and Wylan’s house felt like a comfortable, familiar holiday. The Slat, Kaz, that was a homecoming.

Inej meant to pay a visit shortly after arriving, but a member of her crew had hidden deep in the ship’s belly. Someone else could have done it, but each sailor and hand on  _ The Wraith _ was her responsibility first. After long minutes of shivers and sobs, the girl had entrusted her story to Inej. It was all too familiar. Though Inej and her crew rescued the girl from a ship of a very different sort of pirate, she had first been used and wrung out on the streets of Ketterdam, and the mingling scents of shipyards and harbors broke something inside her. 

Kaz could wait until tomorrow.

Or so Inej thought.

So she thought as she coaxed the girl up from the hold, so she thought as she saw her safely back to the little room she shared with two other girls around her age, both of whom welcomed their friend—one with compassion, one with anger. Some of them were like that. Some of them didn’t know how to hold and just wanted to hurt the people who hurt their own. Inej would counsel mercy in the morning. For tonight, she simply gave her word that she would be here on the ship. No one was coming aboard without her permission.

As she drifted to sleep, Inej thought of her loved ones in Ketterdam. She thought of Kaz literally burning the midnight oil, frowning over his desk. She thought of Jesper and Wylan asleep in each other’s arms. Her thoughts drift farther, to West Ravka, to Mama and Papa and her aunts, uncles, cousins. Somewhere, who knew where, was Nina Zenik and Hanne Brum, hopefully somewhere with pastries and horses.

Inej believed there were many good people in the world. But she only knew for sure that there were a handful.

* * *

"Captain!"

Inej bolted upright, already scrambling out of her bed. The captain’s cabin came with a berth built like a little compartment, but sleeping there felt too much like sleeping in a coffin. It wasn’t as soft or as big as the bed waiting for her on the Geldstraat, but her shipboard bed wasn’t an enclosed wooden box, either.

"Captain Ghafa!"

Her lantern came to life with a hum, the glow turning bright and steady as Inej went to the door. She slept in a shirt and trousers, ready at a moment’s notice—like this moment. 

When she unlocked her door, Specht strode into the cabin without a word, a half-conscious mess of a man in his arms and a crow's-head cane tucked through his belt like a sword. Kaz's head lolled, dark hair falling in all directions.

"Kaz?" Inej asked. Panic threw off the last shreds of sleep. 

Saints, what happened to him?! 

"Found him this way," Specht said, setting Kaz on her bed. He leaned the cane against the bed.    
  
Kaz was bleeding, a dark, wet patch soaking his front. Bleeding, filthy, face swelling—he had been jumped. Inej noted that he was barefoot. 

How did Kaz Brekker get jumped?

Was this calculated or just someone very desperate and very lucky? A calculated hit wouldn’t take his shoes…

"Get Karine," Inej said, but Specht was already on his way.

Alone with him, she brought the lantern closer.

"Kaz?" she asked. "Can you hear me?"   
  
Inej was no Healer, but she knew what to do until one arrived--and she understood what Specht brought Kaz here. As Inej sliced open his shirt and waistcoat, she noticed that he needed a shave. That wasn't like him. Kaz usually took immaculate care with his appearance. And he had been jumped! Instinct told her to pray over him, just quickly, just for a moment in her heart… she did it as she peeled the clothing away. Good, the wound was clear.   
  
He groaned.

"It's me," Inej said. The years had softened Kaz towards Inej, but not toward the world. Being touched by an unseen, unknown hand would be too much for him. "You're going to be fine, Kaz," she promised as she wrapped up a handkerchief and pressed it to his wound. 

His eyes snapped open, mouth set in a snarl.

"It's okay."

"Gonna… kill those… bastards," he gritted out.

That was her Kaz.   
  
His dark eyes settled on her. "Inej."   
  
"You're on  _ The Wraith _ ," she told him. "Specht found you. He's getting our Healer."   
  
Kaz's hand reached vaguely toward Inej. She took it and held onto him with one hand, the other keeping pressure on his wound until a half-sleepy Karine arrived from her little room beside the ship's infirmary. Inej understood why Specht hadn't taken Kaz to the infirmary. It was the same reason he had been sure to bring the cane: Kaz valued his dignity more than his life.   
  
"Captain Ghafa?"   
  
"I need this man stable. The bruises are fine." She could only assume Kaz would want to keep them.    
  
Karine nodded. When they first brought her on board, the first thing the Fjerdan girl had done was hack off her long, golden braids. She wore her hair short now and a little wild in a way that contrasted with her round face and wide eyes, but suited her all the same. After less than a year aboard  _ The Wraith _ , Karine was already confident, sure, and steady. Inej was proud of her.   
  
She hovered a hand over Kaz's injury. Because she'd received no formal training, Karine didn't move like a Healer from the Little Palace might, instead moving her fingers in an almost casual half-dancing motion. Kaz's brow furrowed at the pain of healing. The affectation that it was nothing but an inconvenience might have fooled Karine and even Specht, but Inej felt Kaz's fingers tighten around hers as the bleeding slowed, then stopped completely. 

The Healer checked Kaz for any internal injuries and fixed those she found before they could become a larger problem. Only then did Karine leave her captain and the captain's mysterious friend. With a nod, Specht too gave them their privacy.    
  
Inej hated seeing Kaz this way as much as she knew Kaz hated being seen this way, laid out and vulnerable.   
  
"Karine won't say a word," she said. He already knew he could trust Specht.    
  
Kaz nodded grimly.   
  
"I'm going to clean you up."    
  
It wasn't a command. It was a chance for him to refuse the offer. When he didn't, Inej grabbed a bottle of water and a shirt. Mercher black was severe and suggested austerity. Pirate black hid blood and any other stain. Many wicked men's blood had tried to mar this shirt. What was one more?   
  
As she wiped away the blood from his chest, Kaz reached for a wooden pendant pinned to the wall just above the bed and twisted it between his fingers to get a better look.   
  
"Sankta Marya of the Rock," he observed. "The patron of those far from home."   
  
"It was a gift."   
  
Inej didn't know what, exactly, Wylan had said, only that Marya Hendriks got the idea somewhere that Inej had protected her son. She hadn't, but Wylan gave her that wide-eyed pleading look and Inej let Marya believe it, and Marya welcomed Inej like a distant cousin--a stranger, but family all the same. Now here was her patron. Inej supposed it was fitting; Sankta Marya had protected both of them just as much as Sankta Margarethe, the patron of thieves and lost children. If Kaz had a patron at all, Inej thought, it was Sankta Margarethe.    
  
"What happened?" she asked. "If I'm going to have an army of Ketterdam gangsters gathering on my dock, I'd like to know in advance."   
  
"I was stupid," Kaz replied, "and I paid for it."   
  
"I can see that, but were you very stupid? Was it an on-going stupidity? Or was it a brief lapse in judgment?"   
  
He sighed. "No one should be coming."   
  
Inej nodded.  _ The Wraith _ always had a watch posted and this was no exception. Someone might come but no one would surprise them.   
  
She finished wiping away the blood and helped Kaz into another of her shirts. It was loose and easy to move in, not tailored as he preferred, but it would keep him warm and covered for the night. Then Inej took the other side of the bed, leaving space between them so there would be no accidental touching when they stirred in their sleep.   
  
As she listened in the dark to his steady breathing, Inej's mind drifted again to Jesper and Wylan. They shared a degree of physical comfort that fascinated her. Who would she be, without the Menagerie to shape her? She doubted she would be like Wylan. His touch was too quiet. Inej had seen Kaz bent over his work like Jesper after returning to university, and even without the Menagerie, Inej couldn't see herself going to her lover with a cup of coffee and a gentle hand on his shoulder. Jesper, though--she would not have been so boisterous as Jesper, who was constantly stating his love in every motion, whether that meant a surprise hug or literally sweeping Wylan off his feet.    
  
Inej did not know what touch would have been for the girl she was all those years ago on the shores of West Ravka. If that girl had grown in Inej's place, would she have a Suli boy now? An acrobat? A dancer? Would he hold her at night?   
  
She would certainly not have a thief lord.    
  
Maybe she would have been comfortable with his touch, trusted him with her body like Jesper and Wylan did.    
  
Tonight, she trusted Kaz with her because she trusted him to keep a respectful distance.   
  


* * *

  
  
Inej checked in with her crew the following morning and aided in a thorough inspection of the ship. Any problems were best identified now and dealt with before they set sail again. Some of her crew were off-ship--she always kept enough hands available in case of emergency, but many chose to stay aboard, anyway. There were bad memories in Ketterdam. Inej understood.   
  
She found a seat on deck, her legs dangling over the water. It was a quiet day and she had quiet work to see to, and sitting here, she caught a hint of a breeze sometimes, the smell of the sea instead of the odors of industry. Inej carried a spare pair of trousers with her, a needle and thread, a patch for a nearly-threadbare knee and a quick seam for a tear. There was something to be said for the simple work of maintenance, sometimes.    
  
She didn't know how long she had been working when she heard footsteps approach, accompanied by the tap of a cane.    
  
Kaz sat beside her.   
  
"I'll wash your shirt," he offered. "And your sheets." He had bled some on those, too.   
  
"I'll send you a bill for the laundry," she replied. "Do you know who it was?"   
  
"Yes and no. I know who leaked information, and I'll solve that problem tonight. Just didn't expect it right then."   
  
Of course. His shoes. Inej looked at Kaz's bare feet dangling beside her own. She preferred to go barefoot, when she could. He had been forced into it. Despite the circumstances they could almost look like young lovers on a lakeside picnic, their naked toes dancing just above the water. Except that he was barefoot because he had whispered a rumor about his shoes. She wondered who he had told, and what. That they were lucky? That he kept his secret plans hidden beneath the soles?   
  
A whisper drew her attention. Some of her crew had noticed their captain sitting side by side with a man who had come out of her cabin wearing her shirt. Some of her crew had noticed that Captain Ghafa had taken herself a man.    
  
Let them gossip. It wasn't that far off the mark.   
  
Kaz continued, "I was lucky you were in the neighborhood."   
  
_ Lucky _ . The years had softened Ketterdam to her memory and they had softened Kaz to her, but they had not softened his armor. It had an Inej-shaped hole, that was all. And sometimes he forgot he was wearing it.   
  
She knew, anyway.   
  
The wind tugged at her hair just like a smile tugged at the corner of her lips.   
  
He hadn't been lucky. He heard  _ The Wraith _ made berth in Ketterdam's harbor, and he had come to see her.    
  
"I missed you, too."   



End file.
